Vanessa Redgrave
British actress and activist
In April 2015 I nearly died, as my heart was finding it too difficult to keep my smoke-destroyed lungs going.
How close have you come to death?
Question
When were you happiest?
Time & hindsight
Question
What did you want to be when you were growing up?
Identity & self
Question
What has been your biggest disappointment?
Failure & regret
Question
What song would you like played at your funeral?
Death & what remains
Question
What does love feel like?
Relationships
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
A recurring Guardian Q&A prompt asked directly across respondents and years.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
I nearly died by burst ovarian cyst in 2001. I was doing the front cover of a magazine and someone said, “Can you not pull your tummy in?” It turned out that I had been carrying two litres of blood in my stomach. I was rushed to hospital the next morning and nearly died of septicaemia. They had to give me two blood transfusions. Had it been an hour later it would have been bye bye.
The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 August 2019 source ↗
Others on this question
View all 209 →On the interstate. Anyone who has driven in the United States will know that you are always very close to death – it is like the wild west on the freeways.
Tom Ellis
Welsh actor
Every time I let my wife drive.
Dan Stevens
English actor
Probably on a Los Angeles freeway.
More from Anna Friel
View profile →Finding out I was pregnant when I’d been told it would be difficult to have children.
A barrister or a pop star.
Getting down to the last two of certain jobs (Gangs Of New York and Fight Club) and being thwarted at the last second.
Weird Fishes by Radiohead.
Warm, comforting, hopeful, inspiring and daft.
More on death & what remains
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- What song would you like played at your funeral? 178 answers
- If you had only one day left to live, how would you spend it — and what would you deliberately avoid doing? 54 answers
- What happens when we die? 51 answers
- How would you like to die? 43 answers
- What would you like to leave your children? 42 answers
Also answered this · A–Z
Adam Clayton, Adam Peaty, Adeel Akhtar, Adrian Edmondson, Aidan Gillen, Alex Lawther
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